


Meeting of the Mind Control

by worldstealers



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Astronauts, MK Ultra, Military, Mind Control, Mind Manipulation, Murder, Murder Mystery, Mystery, Outer Space, Politics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-07 06:40:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19079566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/worldstealers/pseuds/worldstealers
Summary: Senate Staffer, Ms. Dumaine, is working for a former astronaut turned politician, Senator Campbell. They visit a seemingly pointless branch of the FBI, gathering research for the Appropriations committee only to find that some mysteries can be solved, no matter how insane they may seem. But of course, there's a price.This story was originally performed on the World Stealers fanfiction podcast. If you like to hear it read out loud with plenty of commentary, find us wherever you listen to podcasts!





	Meeting of the Mind Control

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see that the FBI Agent writing these case files was in love with her partner. Actually I wasn’t using my degree in aerospace engineering for much these days. More like my high school level biology to lay out plainly in legislative proposals that you can’t get HIV from the air. 

...in my professional opinion, the medical diagnosis of the victim’s death, a result of desanguination, is a sound conclusion. However, Agent Mulder’s hypothesis of the physical capabilities of the murder are not based in any realistic understanding of human abilities, and furthermore…

The door to our office opened and Senator Campbell, my boss, walked in. He put down his briefcase and shrugged out of his classic beige trench, careful not to get his crisp blue suit wet from the rain still on his coat. 

“Good Morning, Miss Dumaine.” He said, giving me a pearly all-american smile. 

Unlike most of his colleagues, Senator Campbell showed up on time to his office, rain or snow. Coulda been his military training or the fact that as a former astronaut, the misty rain of DC was nothing compared to the deep dark cold of space. 

“Mornin’, Senator. I’ve got the breakdown ready for this 10:30 at Quantico, but I’m concerned about the department we’re addressing. Their funding isn’t really that big. I made a list of some task forces that could be alternates. I can call em now to reschedule, if you’d like sir.” I closed the blue file folder with the casefiles I was reading through. 

“Ok, Dumaine, hang on there. I haven’t even started the kettle yet.” The Senator kept the smile going as he walked into his small office, off to the left of my desk, crammed full with books, binders, and a large oak desk he’d bartered with a North Carolina congressman to get out of the catalog. He claimed it was the desk of Stephen Mather, the famous conservationist when he worked for the interior. Pretty sure he gave the congressman a rock claiming it was from the moon, even though he wasn’t old enough to have been on Apollo 11. 

“Tea?” He called out through the door.

“No thank you, Senator.” I said, turning on my word processor to print out our inquiry requests for the FBI.

Senator Campbell came back in the tiny lobby, his suit coat off and sleeve rolled up, holding a hot tea and an unopened box of lemon shortbread cookies. I quickly jotted on the notepad that I needed to order more. That was our last box. 

“Dumaine, I’d like you to take the lead on the meeting today.” He said, then sat down in the wing back chair shoved in the corner.  
“Uh,” I was at a loss for how to take the news. On one hand, yes surely I would love to give this hodge podge of a investigative division a texas hammering for incomplete reporting, but on the other I was just the Senator’s staffer. “Sir, I appreciate that, but I don’t really have the authority.”

“Pst,” he said, stopping me and sipping his tea, “You’re the only scientist in the room. You’ll be able to cut through the malarky and get it out of them. The rest of us are just badges and hair cuts.”

“Yes, sir.” I said, then turned to my word pressosor, trying to hide my anxiety over the assignment. 

“Don’t worry, Sarah Beth. I’ll do the charming and you do the sniffing.” He got up, straightened his tie, “You’ve got a better ear for the truth anyway.” He finished. Even while turned away, I saw the tremor in his right hand as he lifted the cup again and walked into his office. 

\-------------------------------------

This man was the kind of handsome you’re not supposed to trust. Or at least that’s what my Aunt Tina woulda said about him. He was sitting across from me, next to his partner, the woman who’s files I’d poured through the last week. They projected professionalism, glancing at each other occasionally to acknowledge a mutual understanding of a question, but not long enough to suggest anything otherwise. They’d been able to remove any coy game from their work life.

Their supervisor was looking at me like a cricket he wanted to squish, which was fine. I was used to that look from conservative representatives who gawked at my qualifications and asked why the hell I was served in government. 

“Respectfully miss, we don’t have to provide that information. It’s at our discretion given the clarification.” Their supervisor said, tight lipped, tilting his bald head at me like the glare would ward me away. 

“Senator Campbell has Top Secret Military Clearance given his former role, so he can easily request any of these documents without your discretion. And to be transparent, Agent Skinner, all those documents pass over my desk.” I said, sighing and closing my folder.

“Miss Dumaine,” started the Agent with the impeccable hair that mismatched his fairly drab suit choice. A devil may care attitude that I guessed worked on most women. “I’d be happy to show you and the Senator anything in my files.” 

He looked over for a second at Campbell possibly for approval. This FBI agent had been giddy ever since we showed up, immediately expressing his renown for the Senator’s background at NASA. This was pretty common actually. Men who watched the moon landing as little boys turned into mush around the Senator. 

“But I am curious, why bother with us? We’re not really all that juicy. I mean, appropriations wise.” He finished. 

This was a question I didn’t have an answer for. I thought of the list of departments sitting on my desk that I’d wanted to rescheduled, and said nothing. 

“Well,” the Senator sat up and cleared his throat, “I’ve only been assigned to the committee recently. Figure we’d start small before tackling the big dogs.”

Agent Scully, as she’d introduced herself earlier, looked at me an eyebrow flinching. I couldn’t tell you for sure, but I swear she sent me a look that said, you’ve got one of these too, huh. 

A few minutes later we were all in their shared cubicle, Agent Mulder pulling out one thick binder after another and stacking them on the desk. His giddiness had increased to mirror that of a boy showing off his christmas toys. Agent Scully and I watched as Senator Campbell flipped through some of the thicker reports, pulling out the occasional black and white photo, unfolding his reading glasses and looking closer to decipher the gray smudges. As he held one closer to his nose, the tremor started up again, slightly jostling the image. He quickly set it down without acknowledging the shake. 

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Scully cock her head slightly. I hoped that she saw nothing but a normal sign of aging. The Senator was approaching 70 after all. But knowing her background in medical science, again I read the reports, I hoped that she didn’t see what was starting to worry me in recent days working for Campbell. A sign of a condition, possibly something that would make him unable to work, and that the round of crodgey opposing congressman would use it as an excuse to put him out to pasture. Scully didn’t seem to react much further.

“Ah, son.” Campbell put a hand confidently on Agent Mulder’s forearm before he pulled out another folder, “Maybe not that one.” I could see a corner of bright read peeking out of the side of the green binder. A magazine maybe. Agent Mulder shoved it back in and shut the cabinet. 

“Yea, that should be all of it.” He said. 

Scully rolled her eyes. 

“Not to say I don’t want to go through all of this,” started Campbell, “I’m sure I’d find it compelling, but in the interest of turning around a presentation to the committee on Thursday, I’m looking for something kind of specific.”

Mulder’s eyes widened. This was another surprise to me, thinking that I would have to sift through the stack over night, but I was still thrown off by the Senator’s ask. 

“Do you have anything that refers to Project MKUltra?” Campbell asked, nonchalantly waving at the files as if he didn’t have that phrase loaded in the canister. I could almost feel the eyebrow raise from the stern women beside me. 

“The government mind control project using RFID and involuntary implanted chips that can be activated with-” 

Campbell moved forward towards Agent Mulder, looking down, “That’s the one.” He smiled then, which made Mulder dig into one exact binder, bent and worn from flipping through. 

It was at this point that I wondered if I was caught up in some kind of goose chase for the purpose of fun and not public service. Scully must have had the same thought as she sighed heavily and leaned onto the cabinet next to her, then examined her closely clipped nails in boredom. 

\-----------------

Campbell was flipping through the copies of redacted and classified files for the second or third time in the backseat of the unmarked black town car we took back to the office. My attache that I’d emptied of bringing back a number of important possibly projects to analyze was empty. All I had taken with me out of Quantico was two business cards. One for Agent Scully and one for Mulder. 

“I can tell you’re not pleased with how that went.” He said. 

I mulled it over then said, “No, sir. We’ve got nothing for the committee.”

He nodded, “They weren’t expecting much from us anyway. Sorry to say it, but we’re the new kids on the block. And we’re not exactly playing by their rules.”

I was starting to feel real heated by his dismissal, “I’m sorry but I quit my job at JPL to pursue this, because your campaign policy was to defund unnecessary military projects and increase science spending. That’s the whole reason I’m here, and I don’t want to be ungrateful, Senator, because you know that I respect your work and all, but…”

“I understand, Sarah Beth.” He said. 

There was a few seconds of silence between us, before we pulled up in front of the capital. When we got out of the car and Campbell gave a friendly goodbye to the driver, we waved me over, then began walking across the street away from the building. 

“Sir, we have to drop these off. They’re classified.” I said, pointing to the file in his hand. 

“Oh here, they’re all conspiracy theories anyway, right?” He held them out to me, “Put them in there.” he looked down at my brown leather attache. I took the folder and walked with him west towards a small cuban restaurant between two large office buildings. 

He ordered a coffee and a mint tea, then sat down at a laminate table in the corner. I sat across from him, confused but accepted the coffee. 

“Before I applied to the space program in the late 70s, I was stationed in South Korea.” Campbell’s voice was hushed, and the cool fly boy attitude I’d become so familiar with was replaced with a seriousness. His right hand rested on the table, shaking much more now,w which Campbell didn’t even notice. I began to sweat a little as he went on. 

“Our unit protected the few military hospitals there, doing flyovers, radar mapping. There was a medical center that was unregistered and we were told was Korean, deep in the woods. We patrolled it, sometimes we’d land the Kiowa, the helicopter,” he clarified for me, “ and do perimeter checks. It was surrounded by barbed wire, and I always had the feeling it was more of a prison than a medical center. One night, there was a power outage. We were sent over because there were reports that the back-up generators had failed. We stocked up our diesel engineers and scooted over there, only to find the place completely empty.” 

The senators hand started tapping at the table, almost knocking off the flatware knife on the cloth napkin. He stopped and looked down at it, then quickly hid it under the table. 

“Look, Sarah Beth. I don’t think I have to fill in anymore details, and I’m not sure we can talk about this in the office, even with the door shut. But this conspiracy theory, was a real project there. I found another set of unclassified reports from back then filed as a survey report for building out barracks, but it’s for this hospital and they use the same code name that’s listed in the files we found today. Linking those two together…”

“Proves who signed off on it and how much.” I finished for him. 

Something about the way I said it made his breathing slow down. I wondered if he thought I would betray him in someway or not understand. I was a rocket scientist. The puzzle came together quickly in my head, and he seemed grateful for it in that moment. 

We didn’t say much else. The plans were laid after that in the silence of the walk back to the office. The attache felt heavier now in my hand. 

\-----

When we got back, there were four cardboard archive boxes delivered filled with the same folder we saw back with the two agents. I guessed that Mulder was eager to share more of his ideas with the astronaut hero he’d spent the morning with. I was too consumed with the plan at hand to care much about the boxes and threw them onto the floor next to my desk. 

Senator Campbell went immediately into his office, then returned with a clean thin yellow folder and handed it to me without speaking. I nodded. 

Our copy machine was less than ideal. A hazard of being a fairly new congressperson was the lack of office size and quality equipment. Luckily I’d gone to MIT with Dimitri, who worked with Senator Bragardi from Louisiana down the hall.

I steeled myself, taking a deep breath before walking into their office, “Dimitri, mind if I use the copier again?” He was on the phone, wedging it between his cheek and shoulder and waved me towards the machine. 

The flashes of light scanning the paper seemed to move slower than normal. The reality of everything was sitting in a fog around me. Mind control chips, from all the way back to the 70s. The possibility of government monitoring on our plans, the creepiness of the some of the files we hadn’t looked through that I only received a glance of at Quantico. If this was true, what else was? 

And then a thought that was lingering since the coffee shop but I had yet to acknowledge. Were we in danger?

The files finished and I gathered them together, then hit copy again. I looked down at the hot, fresh paper I was holding, with two words circled by a faint grey of the Senator’s highlighter on the original. Dolos Program. 

“SB, what’s the deal are you doing Happy hour tonight with us?” 

I turned around to Dimitri standing at his desk, his attention on me holding those papers making me feel more than vulnerable. I mumbled some kind of no and left the office. 

When I got back to the office, Campbell was on the phone, laughing and munching on a lemon cookie. The fact that he had returned to a calm and cool demeanor gave me the ease to sit at my desk and regain some kind of normality. Again, nothing holds a candle to the crushing fear of empty space, I guessed. 

The hours moved by quickly as I pulled together the report, print out a draft with the copies and giving it to Campbell wordlessly. The sun had gone down and he was lit underneath from the desk light, his reading glasses casting a shadow over his eyes as he started to look over it. He looked tired. Older. But still determined. I decided then that no matter a small tremor or deep government danger, that I’d stand by him and see this plan through. 

\------------- 

Sleep didn’t come easily. In fact it didn’t want to show up at all in my studio apartment. I watched old movies on the tiny tv in my kitchen, standing in my pajamas and drinking straight from the milk carton. If my mama saw me she would’ve shrieked at the state of me. 

Mysteries from the world beyond. You may not believe them. But their presence never wanes. 

The voice of the narrator on the show playing made my skin crawl. Mysteries and stories never bothered me before, but now they were showing up everywhere I looked. I turned the TV off and crawled into bed for some fitful sleep. 

Dawn couldn’t have come sooner. I dressed and headed out for the office, hoping that the last minute edits Senator Campbell wanted to squeeze in after I left for work weren’t too much. I was afraid my shocked state the day before might have affected my work. And I’d hate for him to be tired during the presentation. 

I was in the hallway of the building, almost to the door when I saw it was creaked open. The lights were off inside, so maybe the Senator had slept on the couch overnight. I went to open the door but it was stuck, something large blocking the way. 

I shoved it again and felt it move open a little more. I pushed again, not sure what was there or why, confused and breaking into a cold sweat. I managed to squeeze my head in the opening to look inside the dim room. When I looked down at what was blocking the door I focused in on a familiar tie that complemented a crisp blue suit, wrapped around the neck of a swollen blue face. 

I sank to the floor and started to scream. 

Security arrived, running down the hall and helping me up. One or two of them. I couldn’t notice much through the haze of tears growing in my eyes. I walked I think, down the hall, maybe resting on the door to Senator Bragardi’s office. It was locked, no one was in yet. I walked a few feet further to a turn in the hallway. There next to the corner of the wall was a phone booth. 

I opened the brown leather flap of the attache, empty since I’d left everything Campbell needed in the office with him the night before, except for two stark white business cards. 

\-------------------------

“The coroner is saying that right now, unfortunately, Miss Doumaine, it looks like the Senator was alone when it happened. That he used the tie to asphyxiate himself by-”

“No. Not possible.” I said, my voice whispered. 

“We’re so sorry, Sarah. Thank you for calling us, but I don’t know if this case is really within our jurisdiction.” Scully finished, then sat next to me at the bench outside in the hospital hallway. 

“It’s Sarah Beth.” I said.

Mulder was pacing in front of us, rubbing his hand over his chin and face. 

“Senator with a new position on the appropriations committee building a case to take down secret government projects. Has a moral standing as an astronaut with both sides of the aisle. Finally links evidence to a huge spending project for mind control then dies mysteriously!” He stopped in front of us. “I don’t want to say the C word, Scully, but damnit-”

“Coincidence still suggests that two things are without apparent causal connection, Mulder.”

“You use the word apparent like it’s going to deter me, Scully.”

“Y’all, this bickering is real cute and all, but” I let out a big sniffle, “Those documents were gone without a trace when they removed… Sen… Sen…” I fell in to my hands and sobbed. 

Scully put a hand on my back. “I’m sorry we can’t do more.”

\-----------------------------------

The committee hearing was postponed and a memorial scheduled by the end of the day. Riding back the office, we passed the flagpole by the south Capitol Building entrance. A marine was already standing at attention as the flag started lowering to half mast. 

The two FBI agents were driving me back to collect my things, and I guessed check what was left of the files they had sent over the day before. I unlocked the door to the office, which was taped off with yellow police tape, which we moved aside. 

I was never in a situation that involved a crime or murder or death. Everything I’d done was theoretical, with the occasional tested and miniaturized explosion. Senator Campbell had faced death and danger so many times, but I couldn’t depend on him now for comfort. 

The cardboard boxes were all still there, untouched. Mulder calmed lifted off the box lid and started to look through them. Scully walked around inspecting the space. I picked up the box of half eaten lemon cookies and put them in the FBI duffle they’d lent me. 

“Agent Scully.” Mulder said suddenly, looking down into the third box that he’d examined. We both walked over to see the contents. 

On top of blank empty papers was a black box, something that looked like a radio, but was burnt through with a hole. 

“This isn’t ours.” said Mulder simply. 

All three of us looked down on it still, before Mulder said crouching down to get a closer view, “Looks like it self destructed. Exploded from the inside.” Scully was stoic as he examined it. 

“Sarah Beth?” We all turned around quickly to face the door. Mulder reached for something inside his jacket, then pulled his hand away. 

Dimitri stood in the doorframe, looking at me distraught. 

“I heard. I’m so sorry.”

I walked up to him and led him out into the hallway. 

“Thank you. It’s ok. I’m kind of in shock right now.”

“Of course I can imagine.” He said. 

“They’re just helping me get my things and then… I think I’m gonna go home.” I said, calmer than I felt, thinking still of the burnt technology sitting right next to my desk. 

“Back to Texas?” Dimitri asked.

“I don’t know yet.” 

He nodded and put a hand on my shoulder. “Ok. Well please call me if you need anything. And we might be looking for help in Brag’s office if you want to…” he trailed off. 

“Thanks” I said. 

I looked through the open door to the two agents hovered over the box, discussing the contents quickly and closely. I couldn’t heard but I could piece together the ideas they were throwing around. 

He was certain this was the cause. Not suicide but implanted chip mind control. She argued that it was possibly a destroyed bug or listening device if anything. That the idea of Campbell’s chip being activated was extreme. He never had any solid evidence, just an idea. He would say an idea was enough. 

And I would stand outside, trying to think about the next part of my life. 

“SB, I forgot.” I turned to look at Dimitri down the hall. “When you used the copier yesterday, you left a bunch of papers in the tray.” Sadness moved across his face, “Oh sorry I guess you probably won’t need them now.”

 

\-----------------------------------------------------------

“After much consideration of your evidence, Miss Doumaine, and in light of the tragedy surrounding this, we have moved as a committee to in fact take action. We cannot let a fellow government servant and patriot’s mysterious death be disregarded.”

Hours of cross examination and death threats. I could feel the finality of the chairman’s statements. I clasped my hands together under the large table and waited for him to finish. 

“It has become apparent to us that this was an act of domestic terrorism on the back of ill informed conspiracy theorists, fueled by the misuse of funding by Colonel Frenle of the 62nd Unit stationed in South Korea. His forging of documents and siphoning of military spending will be met with prosecution through the military courts, and we thank you Miss Doumaine for bringing this to our attention.”

At the end of the front bench I heard a muffled, “Oh come on,” and turned to see Mulder stand up from his seat and storm out of the chambers. Scully looked over at me and gave a small smile and shrug. We’d tried I suppose. 

\---------------------------------------------------------

I had a plane to catch in a few hours back to California. JPL had gladly taken me back and maybe with a little guilt from the last few weeks of my life. I knew a few guys who would corner me with their own theories of what happened to Campbell and would suffer me a series of questions about it.

I walked into the small cubicle were the two agents were sitting, typing and reading over their work. It was my last stop before the airport. 

“I wanted to come and say thank you.” I said. 

They both stood, Scully speaking first. “We were happy to work with you. We’re sorry it didn’t turn out the way you intended.”

“I’m still looking into the device, I have it in the lab right now to examine for-”

“Mulder.” Scully cut him off.  
“Thank you for that.” I smiled at him, then put my hand in my pocket to pull out something left behind to me that I didn’t really want to hang on to. “I think he would have been pleased regardless. He knew that it would be a longer harder thing to battle. More than just one little hearing.” 

Mulder nodded. 

“At least we got some truth out there.” I said smiling. I reached out and handed Mulder what I was holding. 

“I think he would have also wanted you to have this.” He looked down at a NASA space patch, pulled off Senator Campbell’s orange uniform that he’d worn on the few times he’d managed to get up there.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you liked the story and want to hear it dramatically read aloud, check out our podcast, World Stealers, on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you choose to listen!
> 
> https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/worldstealers


End file.
